


Nine of Swords

by stargazingandsunshine



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Light Angst, Nightmares, Temporary Character Death, four tags and this is already a mess, whatever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-09
Updated: 2015-04-09
Packaged: 2018-03-22 00:42:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3708827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stargazingandsunshine/pseuds/stargazingandsunshine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The nightmares for Oliver, since meeting Felicity, had lessened some. Yes, they were still there, but Oliver was proud to say he could now sleep for a solid five hours without cold sweats or screaming. (At least twice a week. Hey, progress is progress).</p>
<p>For Felicity, however, meeting Oliver could have only brought them about.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nine of Swords

It wasn't fair, not really.

The nightmares for Oliver, since meeting Felicity, had lessened some. Yes, they were still there, but Oliver was proud to say he could now sleep for a solid five hours without cold sweats or screaming. (At least twice a week. Hey, progress is progress).

For Felicity, however, meeting Oliver could have only brought them about. She no longer relied on an overactive imagination for horrifying dreams; she had seen enough, done enough, for her subconscious to have plenty of material to work with.

He learned about the nightmares early in their relationship. It was the second or third time he had stayed over, and he had woken to Felicity kicking his shins. She had begun thrashing out, murmuring something that sounded a bit like his own name until she screamed, freezing his own blood.

He grabbed her then, wrapping his arms around her. Her bare skin was cold and slick with sweat, and Oliver could swear she was gonna tear every muscle in her body the way she was shaking so bad.

He held her even when she clawed at him, nails biting into his skin. He rocked them back and forth, until her screams turned into sobs and her grip on his forearms loosened.

“It was Slade,” she had told him, when the sobs melted to hiccups and shaky breaths. “He had me, and his sword was against my neck. I tried to get away, and I pushed too hard against the blade, and it cut into me. You got there just in time to watch me bleed out.”

He had stilled momentarily as the nauseating guilt mixed with the complete helplessness, filling every inch of him. “He’s not gonna hurt you, Felicity,” he whispered into her hair. “We locked him up. You’re safe.”

She let out a small sigh, turning around in his arms and burying her face in his chest, her arms tucked in. She fell asleep shortly thereafter, and Oliver was careful not to wake her as he shifted them back down. She slept soundly, nothing more than the occasional twitch of her fingers, while he alternated his focus between the ceiling and her heartbeat.

He tried to push her away after that. It was a lot more complicated than before they had started dating, when he had tried to keep her at an arm’s length and she just accepted it. Before he knew what her hips felt like under his palms. Before he knew just how many alarms it took her to get out of bed. Before he knew she had six different bottles of of shampoo in her shower, or that she kept her apartment at arctic temperatures so she could use more blankets.

“Are you gonna tell me what’s going on?” she had asked finally, when they were left alone in the basement of Verdant.

He mentally cursed himself. He had been avoiding this, avoiding her, avoiding being alone together. But he had been ignoring the others, even after they had left to go home to their families.

“What do you mean?” As if he didn’t know.

“Listen, I don’t know if I said something, or did something, or if you just want some space or what, but you gotta tell me. If we’re gonna do this we gotta be on the same page and I can’t just be waiting for a sign from God telling me I did something wrong.”

He wasn’t entirely sure what he was trying to accomplish, pulling away from her. But it wasn’t that. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” he said as quickly as he could, the words tripping over his tongue. “It’s my issue, not yours.”

“Are you about to give me the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ speech? Because honestly, Oliver--”

“No. Nononono,” he practically dropped what he was working on, stepping closer to her. “It’s just… the nightmare…..” God forbid he form a full sentence.

He watched her try to connect the dots in her head, but she stayed silent.

“When you told me it was about Slade, I just… I put you in that position. I didn’t even ask you first, and I let him take you. The things that I put you through, the things you’ve seen because of me--”

“Stop. Stop what you’re doing. Stop acting like you forced me into this, that you manipulated me or coerced me. This was my doing, my choice. I agreed to be here, to be a part of this team. I’m a big girl, I knew what I was signing up for. And yeah, I have nightmares. We all do. There are monsters out there, Oliver. Not just under our beds. We’ve seen them, we’ve fought them, and we’ve won.

“Those nightmares, those memories, they’re proof of that. And I wouldn’t give them up. Not if it meant losing this team. Not if it meant losing you.”

He didn’t try pushing her away again.

* * *

Oliver found it a true injustice, for someone so good to suffer the way she did. No matter how grateful he was to have her in his life, he could never stop regretting his decision to bring her into all of this.  
 ****

(He didn't regret it enough, he thought as he selfishly clung to her shaking form.)

The bright nails digging into his shoulder relaxed some, and she pushed back, crawling out their bed. Wordlessly, Felicity padded into the kitchen for a glass of water. Oliver didn't follow her-- they had gone through this enough times that he knew she was just using the water as an excuse to breathe, to take a break. (The water will end up remaining on the nightstand, untouched, and in the morning she will dump it out and put it in the dishwasher as she always does).

She crawled back into bed a few minutes later, resting her head on his chest, making sure to face away from him, to not meet his eyes. Not let him see the darkness under her eyes, the pallidness of her cheeks, which he knew was there anyway. 

"What was it this time?" he asked softly, taking care not to move his body as he spoke. He brought a hand down slowly to the back of her head, stroking the hair matted from a night of restless tossing. 

She let out a shaky breath, and his hand slid to her upper back, rubbing warm circles into her tee shirt. 

"Sara," she whispered finally. "Diggle, not Lance. She was asking me about her parents. She didn't know them."

Oliver let out a huff of air. That was a new one. Her nightmares tended to repeat, much like his. Usually it was her getting shot. Or himself getting shot. Or Slade taking her, or Laurel getting hurt out in the field. Or Roy doing something stupid for Thea, or Thea doing something for Roy. Cisco and Caitlin getting blown up in some freak explosion at S.T.A.R. labs, her mom getting mixed up in one of their cases.

Once she even had a dream where Barry ran so fast his legs fell off. Literally. Oliver did his best not to laugh at that one, but his absurd self-control only took him so far. Dream-Iris had been devastated, and so had Felicity, until the next day when she realized how absurd that one had been. ("It didn't feel like a dream, though," she told him later. "I mean, I should've seen the clues. It started with you being on time. That would definitely only happen in some wild dream of mine.") 

But the Diggle family had always been off-limits. Like even her subconscious knew where to draw the line. 

"Nothing is going to happen to them," he said finally, forcefully, like he was reassuring himself as well. 

"You don't know that," she said, with the slightest sense of defensiveness. 

His heart made its way to his throat then. Rare were the times when Felicity Smoak thought like that, where she dwelled on the worst possible outcome. 

"Felicity, who is the most stubborn person you know?" 

He felt her smile at that. "You. Without a doubt."

"Nothing will happen to them. I won't _let_ anything happen to them."

"But what if--"

"No. You and I, we're done playing that game. Sara Diggle is going to grow up with two caring, if not totally overbearing, parents. Her aunt Felicity is going to run background checks on all of her dates and her uncle Oliver is going to buy her a car for her sixteenth birthday, despite excessive protests from her parents, which would truly be unfounded considering I would make sure there were at least eight airbags. Because there is truly no point in having a rich uncle if you don't get a car for your sweet sixteen. Laurel will punch the first boy that makes her cry. Roy will take her to her first R-rated movie and Thea will buy her a new closet every other month.

"Felicity," he continued, "Sara Diggle is going to have a normal, healthy life. She is going to grow up safe, and happy, and loved."

Oliver felt her take a couple of deep breaths, too quick together to mean she had fallen asleep. "Do you think we'll ever have one? A normal life, I mean."

"I'm a billionaire and you're an _actual_ certified genius. We never stood a chance."

She shifted on top of him, and he tried not to grunt as her elbow dug into his kidney.

"I love you," she told him, finally meeting his eyes.

Oliver swore he saw pinkness in her cheeks. "I love you."

"Normal seems too boring for us anyway," she mumbled as she closed her eyes. 

**Author's Note:**

> Special shout-out to tumblr user lydiabennettt for tolerating me <3
> 
> The title is actually a tarot card I wasn't even being subtle with that. (technically it usually refers to irrational fears, which is not the case in this fic, but go with it.)
> 
> Anyway this is my first time posting to AO3 and also one of the first things I've written in years, give or take a couple of drabbles. So any feedback, criticism, compliments, whatever is really helpful. Thanks loves:)


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